At a town hall meeting on his campaign-style tour of the Midwest, President Obama claimed that his economic program “reversed the recession” until recovery was frustrated by events overseas. And then, Obama said, with the economy in an increasingly precarious position, the recovery suffered another blow when Republicans pressed the White House for federal spending cuts in exchange for an increase in the national debt limit, resulting in a deal Obama called a “debacle.”

“We had reversed the recession, avoided a depression, gotten the economy moving again,” Obama told a crowd in Decorah, Iowa. “But over the last six months we’ve had a run of bad luck.” Obama listed three events overseas — the Arab Spring uprisings, the tsunami in Japan, and the European debt crises — which set the economy back.

“All those things have been headwinds for our economy,” Obama said. “Now, those are things that we can’t completely control. The question is, how do we manage these challenging times and do the right things when it comes to those things that we can control?”

Isn’t Obama really saying: Vote for me because things were out of my hands and without me the economy could be a lot worse?

With Texas Governor Rick Perry having just announced his Presidential bid on Saturday, he has already rocketed to be the main challenger to front-runner Mitt Romney. This poll was conducted August 4-7 with Colorado Republican voters. There is a 5.5% margin of error.The entire poll is here.

President Obama’s job approval rating dropped to 40% during the week spanning Aug. 8-14, the lowest weekly average of his administration. During this period, Obama’s three-day rolling average also hit a new low of 39% for Aug. 11-13, the first such average below 40% since he took office, though it recovered to 41% for Aug. 12-14.Obama’s weekly average was 42% for the two weeks prior to last week, which at that time also marked new lows for his administration. His lowest three-day average prior to Aug. 11-13 had been 40%.

Why?

Probably widespread disapproval of the way the President handled the debt-limit crisis and a drop in confidence regarding Obama’s handling of the economy.

Also, the Republican Presidential field is being solidified and have been attacking Obama directly.

But, the implications are very clear.

Although the new lows in Obama’s job approval rating represent only a slight drop from his previous low readings, they symbolically underscore the weaker position the president is in as he begins a “listening tour” of the Midwest this week.

Ten incumbent presidents have sought re-election since World War II, and none has won a second term with final pre-election job approval ratings below 48%. The last two presidents who lost their re-election bids — George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter — had job approval ratings in the 30% range in the fall of the election year. Thus, Obama’s challenge is not only to move his rating back above 40%, but also to push it close to or above 50%.

But then how do we explain California? From the time of the Gold Rush through 2000, the number of California residents not born in California grew every census. But, for some reason, that stopped in the 2000s. The number of Californians born in a different state actually fell by almost 1 million over the last decade. Why?

Thanks to native births and immigration, California’s population did grow. But Texas’ native birth rate and immigration flows were about the same. Yet over the same decade the number of Texans born out-of-state grew by almost a million. Why?

Matt is despereate to have you believe that Americans suddenly stopped wanting to live in California and started wanting to live in Texas. But why did this happen? Couldn’t have anyhting to do with the fact they were offered jobs in Texas could it?